Roman Franc + Julien Mauve

February 3 – April 1

Curatorial Statement

Julien Mauve builds a narrative slowly, one piece at a time. Something is brewing… clouds are gathering; birds take flight; the television turns to static as the galaxy whorls. In The Indifference of the Stars, single frames, when viewed by themselves, hold a limited meaning. When viewed together in sequence, they form a more expansive feeling, both familiar and mysterious, and pregnant with questions.

Light runs through the series as a means of communication. Humans bring their loneliness to the sky, and light courses back as a dialogue, unconsummated. Man is brought into the scene as a solitary figure, standing hauntingly still. The series moves from micro to macro, with light shining on individual objects and then the constellation of a greater whole.

Roman Franc’s series, Sight Lines, plays with the accuracy of vision to magical effect. Franc has us stargazing during the day. By sometimes hiding and sometimes revealing, employing mirrors, and obscuring planes of vision, he turns simple scenes into enigmas. He deals in the mystery of sight.

Franc is attuned to the the many versions of a person. In this work, he highlights the theme of duality and the idea that there are multiple sides of the self. People extend beyond their bounds through reflections, or a shadow, or a duplicate.

The elements in Franc’s imagery form a sense of companionship with one another. Shadows befriend the light and reflections keep their figures company. In Mauve’s work, a companionship is present, but it’s found inside the loneliness. He reminds us that the act of looking to the stars in our solitude is a shared human experience. We are all small beneath them.

Roman Franc: Sight Lines

Roman Franc (b. 1983) lives and works in the Czech Republic. Franc studied photography at the ...

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